Category Archives: generate income
A Worldwide Audience to Address.
When you sit down and think about all the people in the world that would like to make more money, you could pretty much include just about everyone.
Every person from every little corner of the population could use extra cash and that is really the target audience. So in essence, your target audience consists of the close to 7 BILLION people that live in this world, 3.4 billion of them have high speed internet and would love to have access to a platform like Wealthy Affiliate.
That is a pretty MASSIVE target audience, so within this post I am going to give you a hand with some more targeted examples of audiences and show you exactly how to break them down.
Pretty big and pretty broad right? That was intended to prove the scale of the market that you can promote to, and within this section we are going to explain smaller more niche target audiences and also let you in on some ways in which you can research and market to these audiences.
When many affiliates begin to work on their keyword and industry research for Wealthy Affiliate research, they typically think of the most obvious marketers that are highly relevant to the services offered at Wealthy Affiliate. The main audiences that come to mind are:
Making Money
Work From Home
Internet Marketing
Affiliate Marketing
PPC Marketing
Email Marketing
These are fine and they are definitely targeted, however marketers typically run into a wall when they attempt to promote under these keywords as they are very competitive. They convert, but they are competitive.
More Targeted Niches
Because of this, we recommend also venturing into other very targeted niches. I have included a list of these below:
Entrepreneur Programs
Website Marketing
Local Marketing
Social Media Marketing
Twitter marketing
Facebook Marketing
Linked In marketing
Email Marketing
Google Adwords
Google content network
BingAds
PPC Marketing
Clickbank
Data Entry
Home Business
Search Engine Optimization
Article Marketing
Getting Rich Quick
Become a Millionaire
Search Engine Marketing
Self-Employment
Affiliate Programs
Affiliate Networks
Wordpress Plugins/Theme/Hosting
Website Hosting
Website Builders
Internet Marketing Tools
These are all hot topics and highly related to what is offered within Wealthy Affiliate. Anyone looking for help in any of these areas can easily get help and get training within the Wealthy Affiliate community if you look a little deeper you find that there are even more than the obvious.
Demographics to Target
These can all be target audiences and I am going to show you how to elaborate on these. However, there are complete demographics of people that should not be forgotten about. Massive groups of people that are looking for opportunities, to create businesses online or to expand their existing businesses online.
College Students
University Students
Retired Individuals
Middle Class Populous (large majority of US consumers)
Retired Veterans / Disabled Veterans
Disabled Individuals (who can work from their computer)
New Career seekers
Career Development/Advancement seekers
Laid Off Employees
Unemployment Benefits
People with massive hospital/health bills
Low Salary Employees
High Salary Employees that Want More
Minimum Wage Workers / McJobs
Passive Income Seekers
Residual Income Seekers
Baby Boomers About to Retire
People Who Vacation Lots (like the freedom)
Loans/Cash Advances
People with a mortgage
People that are forced to foreclose their homes
Debt Consolidation
People with Undesirable Jobs
Office Workers
People looking to win the lottery
Computer Jobs and remote jobs
People interesting in computer programming
Residents at business and Internet marketing schools
People looking to get a marketing, finance, or business education
Someone who wants to quit their job
Franchising/Franchisees
Ebay Sellers
Summer Job Seekers
Part-Time Employment
People seeking any type of employment!
Employment Search Engines (JobSearch, Monster, Careers.com)
Criminal Employment (employment for criminals)
People seeking post secondary education (can target University and College names)
Real Estate Investors
Online Surveys Takers
Related Forums and discussion rooms
TV Shows (Apprentice, Deal or No Deal, etc)
Famous Rich People (Bill Gates, Robert Kiyosaki, Tim Ferris)
Hard Copy Books (Rich Dad Poor Dad, Buzz marketing, etc)
Affiliate Network Keywords (CJ, Clickbank, Linkshare, Shareasale, Kowabunga, etc)
These are some demographic based audiences that you can target. These above ideas alone will give enough ammunition to promote your niche for a lifetime!
With what we have already given you, you could easily scale a campaign to make over $1 MILLION per year…in fact, if you put your effort into just one of these target audiences, you could likely make that with just one.
Remember, the average affiliate referral for Wealthy Affiliate is close to $150. Commissions and recurring revenue add up very quickly!
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Tempus Fugit! as the saying goes. Time truly does fly, and frustratingly seems to speed up the older you get. I think there’s a name for that effect, but i’m not sure we need to really know it here. However, time is a finite resource for everybody and is thus the most precious in The World. Some of you out there have more of it left than others, but you can never be sure. The man with the big scythe always pops up uninvited.
We don’t make best use of our time though, and a good deal is wasted watching rubbish TV programmes or arguing on internet forums and Facebook about unimportant subjects. Time is the fourth dimension, and despite the best efforts of Einstein and Brian Cox, we can’t turn it back. It flows inexorably on, but each person has only a tiny snippet of it, then we’re gone.
The average life expectancy of a human in Britain today is about 80yrs (how many hours is that?). I know it varies by gender and by area of the country, but that’s roughly how long we have to make our mark on this Earth. That seems a long time, but let’s examine it in closer detail.
A 3rd of our life is spent asleep. That’s 56 hours of every week, or 27 years of our lifetime! That’s an incredible length of time just recharging our batteries. While we are asleep of course, we can’t do anything else. We can’t work or earn money in that time.
We don’t start work until 18 years old, and we stop when we are 65. That leaves us with a working window of 47 years. Still plenty of time to earn money though, right?
Now, let’s look at the week. Only 168hrs in each week, with 48hrs in a weekend. Most people only work on 5 days, so that leaves 120 hours. As we’ve already said, a third of our time is spent asleep, so that leaves us with 80 hours. Most jobs are 35-40hrs/week, so that means that during the week, we work for roughly 50% of our waking hours. No-one wants to work weekends, that’s family time (but plenty do).
Wages are typically between £8 and £12 per hour. So, doing a quick calculation, that limits earnings to between 35×8 = £280 and 40×12 = £480 per week. That’s roughly £1,100 to £2,000 per month. Tax will take a sizeable chunk out of that for most people. Indeed, mortgages or rent could easily consume 75%-all of this in certain areas of the country. It’s easy to see how most people have nothing much left at the end of the month.
So, what can we do about it? Conventionally, there are only two choices, we work longer or we get a payrise. We are already working for 50% of our waking hours, so increasing that will only lead to burnout and exhaustion. A pay rise? Most people only get 1-2% each year, and traditionally that is mostly eaten up by inflation. We are stuck! The answer is seemingly that most people can do little about it.
What is the answer? Is there an answer? Well, people like the Kardashians and David Beckham have stumbled on a way by being famous. The have multiple sources of income (perfume, endorsements, branding, media, public appearances, sponsorship) and the money rolls in 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They appear to have multiple personas, all earning for 168 hours per week, 52 weeks of the year. They are money making machines! Can mere mortals do this too?
Well, to do it you have to think outside of the box. This is primarily a property blog and as most of you know, property is the way to a passive income. You do the work once (buy the house, rent it out) and are paid for it every month in rent. By rinsing and repeating this scenario, you can build up a nice little portfolio and a good income. But, remember what Grandma used to say about putting all your eggs in one basket? Rules change, markets crash and tenants leave. You need another secondary income stream to sit alongside your property business.
The Internet has made information the biggest product in the World. Everybody needs it and people will pay for it. This is where the opportunity lies to make limitless passive income. You don’t need a product or even a website, you can make really good money promoting other people’s products. Then, when you get good at it, you can start promoting your own products. What can you promote? Basically anything!
This is the way to earn money like the Kardashians and Beckham. It’s the ONLY way to break free from the hours/pay rate trap, because multiple income streams allow you to earn like there are 5 or 6 ‘you’s, all bringing in money 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. I’m enrolled with Wealthy Affiliate because I believe in multiple streams/diversity of income. You should seriously consider it yourself to both continue your education and maximize your potential.
When you have put out lots of yellow letters to your target houses, you’ll soon start to get phone calls (well, hopefully you will if you’ve written a good letter). Quick tip – get yourself a dedicated phone to allow people to ring you. Don’t use your normal phone number. If the phone rings, don’t pick up. Chances are you’ll be doing something else and won’t be prepared for the phone call. Let it go to voicemail and then call back. Sometimes the caller leaves a message and sometimes they’ll drop you a text telling you which house they’re ringing about. This is all good info. Ring back when you’re comfortable and have all of your gear to hand (pen, pro-forma, script). Find a comfortable place to do it from. In the recent hot weather I’ve been using the garden as my office.
Run through your script and make sure you ask all your questions, but try not to make it sound like a list. Try to strike up a conversation and work the questions into it. This way, the vendor won’t feel uncomfortable. You’ll find it easier too. Sometimes the owner will be enthusiastically helpful, they’ll tell you all kinds of things in addition to the questions you want answers to. Sometimes you’ll get short answers and they’ll not go into any financials. I always say that without knowing all the facts it will be impossible to make them an offer. Sometimes that persuades them, sometimes not,
but when you’ve gathered everything you need to know, tell them you’ll go away and do some number crunching, then get back to them.
When you are first starting out with Lease Options, like we were a few months ago, you’ll not realise whether there’s anything in it for you as you fill in the forms. After a while, you instinctively recognise when a house is a possible lease option and there’s going to be a good positive cash flow if the owner takes up the deal. Try to get £250 positive cash flow each month if possible. Here are a few examples of the types of situations we’ve discovered.
A good opportunity – money in the deal for both parties
House for sale price : £70,000 (reduced from £80,000)
Mortgage : none
Reason for selling : Moving in with someone else
Wants to be a landlord? : No
Needs the money? : No, more interested in income
Likely monthly bills : £200 (council tax, gas/electricity, insurance, water)
Rental in area : £550 pcm
In this example, the fact the owner has no mortgage is a good thing because it gives you the latitude to pay them a good monthly amount, whilst still having a decent positive cashflow for yourself in the deal. It’s necessary to compute a likely term for your lease option. This depends on the rental value and the purchase price.
Now for a bit of maths. Decide what you purchase price will be. To give the owner an incentive, that would have to be £70,000 or more, so I always find out if the house has been reduced and by how much, then if that price seems reasonable, i’d offer them more.
The house is currently for sale at £70k, but i’d tell the seller that I could offer them £80k (the price before the property was reduced), but i’d need time to pay it.
An £80k house will need a £20k deposit for a BTL mortgage, so the next thing you need to do is calculate how long it’s going to take for the rental you intend to make on the property to add up to £20k. If you get £550 ppm in rental, a good offer would be £200 each and every month to the vendor. That would leave £350 to save for the mortgage, plus to pay for any monthly fees you may have. Let’s say that leaves you with £250 per month.
£20,000 / £250 = 80 payments.
This means it’ll take you just shy of 7 years to save your deposit. So your offer to the seller could be :
Lease Option Offer
Offer £56,000 [OR]
Option to buy the house in 7 years for £80,000
In the meantime, they’ll be paid £200 pcm until then
In 7 years you’ll have enough to get a BTL mortgage on the property, without using any of your own money! In the meantime, you’ll control the property and be bringing in £350 pcm from it for 7 years. The seller will be £350 pcm better off (no bills + your payment). Of course, all of this is negotiable and if the seller wants a higher price, you’ll need a longer term, and conversely, the sooner the seller wants his money, the lower the price you’ll pay.
You could also structure the deal so that the owner is paid more per month, but this will reduce the final purchase price after the option period. If the owner is paid £500 pcm then calculate how that extra payment reduces the final buy price.
A bad opportunity – no money in the deal for you
House for sale price : £70,000 (reduced from £80,000)
Mortgage : £65,000 remaining. Repayment mortgage (£450 pcm)
Reason for selling : Moving to a bigger house
Wants to be a landlord? : No
Needs the money? : Yes
Likely monthly bills : £200 (council tax, gas/electricity, insurance, water)
Rental in area : £400 pcm
The vendor wants to sell, but there’s no cashflow in the deal for you. Even if you rented out the house at the local rental rate, you wouldn’t be covering the mortgage payment. In addition, you wouldn’t be able to offer the vendor that lucrative income either. He would be better off by not having to pay the bills, but there’d be no money to save for your BTL mortgage after the period of the lease, so there’s no lease option offer that could be made. In this case, the owner has also said he needs the money immediately.
As this offer is £9k less than the vendor owes on his mortgage, he’s unlikely to accept (unless you’re VERY lucky). At only £400 pcm available in rent in the area, the yield would also be on the low side when you rented it out.
The internet has open the gates to information, and we get bombarded with numerous new articles on social media, in our email inboxes (subscribed or simply spam), and pretty much everywhere we look, on a daily basis.
This has led us to have to work harder to find the best articles from the multitude of average or sub par content. To help our readers and those interested in property investing, we decided to dig in and search for the best of the best that 2018’s Blogosphere has to offer.
This list is obviously subjective, but we also tried to work with a few stats when we sort them.
The Subjective side of things – we tried to feature some of the best known sites in this niche, some that are known by many in this business, and also a few blogs that still have a lot of growing to do and are relatively unknown. This last category has a few blogs that we feel have good content, tips and/or insights.
The Stats criteria refers to data collected from:
Alexa.com – How much traffic they have
Social media – How many followers they have on Twitter and Facebook
Publishing schedule – If they write content on a regular basis, if they haven’t updated the blog in a long time and so on.
Top 20 Property Investment Blogs for 2018
Biggerpockets.com
The BiggerPockets Blog is the biggest resource of information about real estate, investing and personal finance on the web and thus why it’s our #1 choice.
Besides the usual written information, they also have a 65,000 listens per show podcast available for those that like to listen to the market news and insights.
Besides all the opportunities that the site offers (the platform, the forums, the blog and the mobile apps), what we like the most, and have rarely seen in this niche, is the regularly updated Youtube account.
They are posting 2-3 videos per week, and you can also check out the podcast in a video format if you want to actually see their guests. I like visuals more than just audio, so for me this is a big thumbs up.
Fortunebuilders.com
The mission of this blog is summed up by the three words featured in their logo – Inspire. Educate. Lead.
Inspire – To help and motivate others to pursue their dreams and change their lives for the better.
Educate – To commit to personal growth that will, at a later stage, improve their business.
Lead – To take action and follow through all the obstacles.
The blog is updated daily with articles tackling subjects like Real Estate, Investing, Finance and Business. People seem to really dig what they are saying and posting, as we can see from the almost 30,000 followers on their Twitter account.
Affordanything.com
Paula’s journey is one of those stories that you end up dreaming about having: a boring 9-to-5 job that turns into travelling around the world and working remotely. You can read the entire story on her About page, where she talks about how she started a real estate business, and enjoys the “easy money” that her investments yield every month.
The best content on her blog, in our opinion, is her Real Estate Investment Report posts, and by the multitude of comments on these pages, others share the same opinion.
In these posts she offers a break down on her monthly income and expenses, alongside many tips for those that will want to follow her business model.
Retipster.com
After nearly a decade in the commercial banking industry, Seth Williams decided to pull the plug and become a self-employed man starting on February 1, 2016. This great to see, especially if you are a long time reader of his blog because you’ll have the feeling that you are following someone who really knows his stuff.
Someone who has turned a part-time business in something full time that can guarantee an income big enough to keep him happy.
One page in particular to look for, especially if you are a beginner, is the Resources page where Seth has listed sites and services that he personally used to help him grow the blog and business.
Reiclub.com
REIClub is a website full of resources, very tightly organized by categories, a feeling that will strike you at the first sight of the homepage. It’s like a dossier full of all the resources needed for any person interested in Real Estate Investing.
Besides the video section, forum, laws or success stories, the blog is the best part of the website. Why? Because it is updated with articles from the community, and the many contributors that share tips and knowledge from their personal interactions with this business.
This can be a great thing when you think about it, because you get to learn from a vast array of people working in different locations, investing in different properties or businesses and telling the stories from their own perspective.
Realestateinvestar.com.au
RealEstateInvestar is a provider of online property investing tools that targets Australia and New Zealand.
It can help investors by letting them create capital growth forecasts, maintain real time portfolio tracking, and eliminate paper and data entry work to make it simple for your accountant and for tax and cash flow forecasting.
The blog focuses on providing tips for investors about how to manage and grow their portfolio, tips on how to spot properties that can lead to big returns in the near future, and mistakes that they should avoid.
Deangraziosi.com
Dean Graziosi is mostly known for his TV infomercials where he sells his real estate investing books and events.
The site mostly features his videos from the Weekly Wisdom series, but also contains deals that he closed recently, alongside any tips and insights that came with those experiences.
Beside the main website, there a two more sources of great info: the Forum and the Blogs section. Here you will get to know how other investors are doing, what kind of properties are bringing in big profits, and the most importantly, what bad deals to stay away from.
Realestateinyourtwenties.com
Brandon shows us in his blog that real estate investing is not only for big companies or very experienced investors, but that it can be done also by young people, in their twenties – pun intended.
He is the VP of Growth for BiggerPockets (our #1 listed blog in this list), and also a Co-host of the BiggerPockets Podcast. So, all in all, a well versed guy in the real estate investing market.
Cthomesllc.com
The CT Homes blog is arguably the most consistently update blog in our list. This means that every week day you will have a new article to read – everybody has to enjoy their weekend off, right? J
And even though the main website is a platform for investors and people wanting to sell properties in the San Diego area, the information posted in the blog section is generic and can be adopted by anyone from anywhere.
Memphisinvest.com
Shifting our focus a little more to the right of the US map, we encounter the guys from Memphis Invest who have grown from a small family owned real estate investing company, to one that serves clients from 45 states in 11 countries. At the moment they have three local offices located in Memphis, Dallas and Houston.
The blog features articles about real estate investing in general, but the most insightful posts are those that focus on the areas that they have the most knowledge in like the cities where their offices are. Insights, tips and news.
Cleverinvestor.com
The first thing that caught our attention on the site was the “Proof” page on the main navigation bar, so we took a look. Inside we saw a bunch of video testimonials and picture with happy sellers.
That made us curious and searched a bit more about him and everything seems to check out. This guy seems to be the real deal.
Cody is proud that he still practice what he preaches and likes to be an active real estate investor who hunts for great deals and find those win-win situations: happy sellers and happy buyers, with a small profit for the person in the middle.
Jasonhartman.com
When we speak about the real estate industry, Jason is a fantastic example of hard work and persistence. He embarked on his career in real estate quite early.
When only 19, he was brokering properties for clients, then he landed a place among the top one-percent of Realtors in the U.S.; won important awards in the industry and became a young multi-millionaire.
Jason is now the CEO of the Platinum Properties Investment Network and is blogging to provide real estate education and valuable information, including advices related to markets, ROI, cash flow, opportunities and much more.
Joecrumpblog.com
Working in real estate investments since 1986, Joe has experienced many ups and downs in the market.
So, behind the system he created for real estate investments is a lot of trial and error, but also a creative way of financing that he adopted, and he is sharing this knowledge on his blog.
Joe found a way to have more freedom and control of his life through real estate investing, and he is trying to help other achieve the same.
Theinvestorinsights.com
Voted as #1 real estate investing blog for two times in a row by the REIClub.com, in the “Single-Author” category, The Investor Insights provides excellent information for real estate investments.
An investor since 1994, Susan Lassiter-Lyons founded this blog in 2006 to share insights about her creative investing activities.
Owned and operated by real investors, who have closed more than 600 transactions in the last few years, this is more than just a blog, it really serves a coaching platform for those interested in the real estate investments business.
Hipsterinvestments.com
This is a blog that seems to bring a lot of energy to its readers, as there are many positive comments and good content reviews left by the blog’s visitors.
The Hipster Investments blog provides real estate education, and information about the industry and even helps investors to connect with reputable companies.
An interesting particularity of this blog is their “Latest Deal – What’s available on Wednesday?” section, where they post weekly deal proposals.
Reiwealthmag.com
A digital magazine with a team of experts and extensive media, marketing, and real estate history, REI Wealth Monthly has a blog that provides up-to-date real estate investing content.
Whether you need news, tips, or articles covering topics like strategies in the industry, you can rest assured that you will find them here.
The blog is wonderful for both those who just started out in the real estate industry, and the seasoned investors.
Kcinvestmentproperty.wordpress.com
Chris Lengquist has been blogging about Kansas City real estate investing since 2006, and he has been a professional Real Estate agent for several years, who works more in an advisory and consultation area of expertise than as a salesperson.
So, the blog has a focus on the Kansas City market, and will offer you real experiences or even guidance through any confusion related to these kinds of experiences.
Chris provides solid answers to the questions that come up for real estate investors.
Thebostoninvestor.com
When it comes to flipping houses, Justin Silverio has a lot of tips to share with those that are still new to the real estate business.
Out of Boston, he is a natural fit for the real estate industry. That’s because, first of all, he was “born with it”, we could say, as he comes from a family with decades of experience in construction and real estate and, second of all, because he has also a personal work experience background of over 10 years in the industry.
On his blog he shares advices about how should you get started in this industry, a lot of tips related to wholesaling and related to how should you work with partners and he’s also sharing up-to-date records of his real estate investment activities.
Investingnownetwork.com
This is the blog of Jim Ingersoll, a successful real estate investor who shares some great practical posts about real estate investments strategies and tips, giving solid guidance based on his vast experience of wholesales, flips, and rents.
He also leads webinars on these topics, so you will have the chance to interact on his blog with videos of this kind.
Jim shows us that you can do investments without using a bank or your own money. That’s something quite “disruptive” in this type of business.
Initially published at http://internationalmoneytransfers.org/best-property-investment-blogs/
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Hilton Hall, nr. Walsall
After waiting for what seemed like an age since we first went on the Samuel Leeds Property Investors Crash Course in Manchester in February, we rocked up to Hilton Hall just outside of Walsall for the next stage on our property journey. What a place to have a training session! It’s set in it’s own grounds with lakes and untold prettiness (squirrels and other furry critters abound). I bet working there is an absolute treat.
One of the first things we noticed was how many familiar faces we recognised from the earlier course. Everyone looked just that little bit more confident than some of the slightly timid characters we first met in the cold days at Salford. Maybe it was just the fact that summer had rolled into town this week that did it, but we got the impression that the crowd were very up for it.
This course was over three days. Everyone had paid a premium for these sessions; they’re more in-depth than the free Crash Course days. You can tell that the people are more committed and convinced that property investing is their future and everyone wanted to learn as much as possible from Samuel. The first day was the Deal Finding Extravaganza and day 2 and 3 were dedicated to Never Use Your Own Money Again, or as it’s catchily abbreviated, ‘NUYOMA’ (sounds like the Japanese teacup guy off Britain’s Got Talent). We all overloaded the Hall’s Wifi connection as the mass of electronic wizardry tried to log on to get access to RightMove, MousePrice and Zoopla.
Now, i’m not going to give away any information that Samuel taught us because that would undermine the integrity and point of the whole thing, but we watched as he found deals live from his computer at the front of the room and then worked out the yields and returns on investment. Very rarely did he turn up anything lower than 25% ROI. Then he set us all off to find our own deals in the lunch break.
The afternoon consisted of people revealing their ‘deals’, and then we all piled out to visit a couple of Samuel’s HMOs in Wolverhampton, followed by a visit to Cosmos Asian Fusion Buffet where I’m sorry to admit we rather stuffed our faces (but Samuel was picking up the bill). It seemed straightforward. We agreed to give a lift to Rob, who was in his camper van, and the idea was that we’d take him to his camp site, drop the van off, then take him to the HMOs, but we lost him in the outskirts of deepest, darkest Walsall and by the time we found him again, we’d missed the first HMO completely, and only got to the second one as everyone else was coming out! The day had been great though, and everyone was still buzzing in Cosmos even after 12 hours of intense property hunting.
NUYOMA
Day 2 opened with the brightest and bushiest tailed people in the room by 8:15am for the nine o’clock start. We were in the Travelodge Southbound on the M6, so frustratingly had to head south to the next junction, then do a U turn and come back again (about 10 miles in total). It was only after we’d done this a couple of times that Zach, a sprightly young student of accountancy, who unknown to us was also at our hotel, revealed a secret service road he’d been walking in on. It was only a mile and a half! We had to go through a no-entry sign, but it saved us loads of time. The second and third days are dedicated to No-Money-Deals. Basically, buying property with other people’s money. Sounds good doesn’t it?
Samuel taught us several ways to do this (a couple of which we’d already successfully done in ‘real life’) and there was a very interesting and valuable presentation by Sarah Poynton-Ryan who took us through Compliance, Bribery and Data Protection Laws amongst others, as well as introducing Deal Sourcing, Deal Packaging, R2R and Serviced Accommodation. (MEGA profits to be made on Serviced Accommodation, must look into that closer to home). The pace remained high until the slightly earlier finish time, with the usual role playing things to get everyone out of their comfort zone and thinking laterally. Thank God for the sandwich van is my only other comment.
On day 3, Zach took us on our little short cut, but the weather had turned foul and it was tipping it down as we got to Hilton Hall. Rob, who’d cycled in on day 2 had resorted back to the camper van. Sensible chap Rob. We again got stuck into some great exercises, real fun stuff, to show us how easy it is to network in a room full of similar minded individuals (and get deals). There was a question and answer session with a very loveable mortgage expert who managed to answer EVERY question thrown at him by the baying hordes (Stop it! – Ed) and by the time the lovely sandwich van came again the punters were salivating for more. Our working lunch was to go away and raise ‘virtual finance’ by thinking of how we could use our friends and countrymen to slip us a quid or two to invest in our property empires. Samuel set a target of £1m. Zach got the job of counting the money.
Myself, Samuel Leeds and Deb
Going round the room, it was clear that we were going to absolutely smash the target and when the final total was computed it was around the £4.5 million mark. FOUR AND A HALF MILLION POUNDS !! Granted, that was a fantasy fundraising exercise, but it just showed the power of networking and collaborating within a common goal. Summing up the successes and learnings were at the end of it all. When we all broke up I felt like I was leaving old friends. However, I think we’ll be meeting some of you again, maybe in a Joint Venture or maybe we can source a property or two for you ‘up north’.
Altogether, the 3 day course was well worth the money. We filled the gaps in out knowledge that we wanted to fill, and learned a whole lot more as well. Many thanks to Samuel Leeds and his team, the sandwich van, Cosmos and the staff at the Travelodge, as well as Walsall chippy that stopped us eating each other at the end of day3.
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House 1 – 2 bed terraced
Our property journey really started when we decided to move to Durham in 2014. I had been living in my house for 18 years and then rented it out to enable me to move. I was an ‘accidental landlord’. The details are as follows and the values are current ones. All the houses are in NE England.
Purchase Price : £32,500
Current Market Value : £45,000
Rent Currently Received : £4,320 pa
House 2 – 2 bedroom semi
The house we bought in Durham in 2014 was built in 1999/2000 and again is 2 bedroomed, but it’s semi-detatched. It was owned by a former student of Durham who became a lecturer at Nottingham Uni. He’d rented it previously. We’re only 1 mile from the city centre, so the higher prices there are going to radiate out in coming years, giving us extra equity to play with (we’re down to about £76k on the mortgage, so maybe £50k to play with next year).
Purchase Price : £113,000
Current Market Value : £140,000
House 3 – 3 bedroom end terrace
We then started seriously looking at property as our way of making passive income. We sourced our next house which was up for auction with a £6,000 fee. This didn’t make it enough BMV, so we asked the vendor to drop it from the auction, waited 31 days then put our official offer in (we’d already verbally agreed a price). The house was in nice condition and only need £2,000 spending on it. We then refinanced after 6 months and took our deposit back, making the house completely purchased with other people’s money!
Purchase Price : £55,000
Current Market Value : £80,000
Rent Currently Received : £4,680 pa
House 4 – 2 bedroom mid terrace
The next property we bought was a 2 bedroomer, a relative new build at the end of a cul-de-sac, next to a church. The vendor lived in London and was in poor health, so a motivated seller. He had the house advertised on Rightmove for £59k. We secured it for only £44,000. This one needed more work, but we spent £11k on doing it up (some internal structural changes) before refinancing again after 6 months and taking our money back.
Purchase Price : £44,000
Current Market Value : £75,000
Rent Currently Received : £5,040 pa
House 5 would have been an £80k house; we had an offer accepted, but pulled out because the deposit money was needed elsewhere.
Currently financing
We are currently financing a 3 bedroom cottage for our son who bought it for £55k in Durham (so jealous because we sourced it for him). This one was also an auction property and we paid £6k to remove it from auction. It had a sitting tenant, but the vendor evicted at our request. He’s spending about £35k on it (it needed new windows, lintels, bathroom and kitchen and he’s removed two chimney breasts). The real market value when finished will be circa £115,000, so a tasty profit. He’ll then remotgage and we’ll get our money back out for future investments.
The rental from houses 1,3 and 4 pay for themselves as well as the mortgage payment on our own house (house 2). After 3 house purchases the whole thing becomes a cash generator. 😎
For the future, we are looking out for further opportunites in the North East.
Any comments or questions are welcome. 👍🏻
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- Shoe Money shoemoney.com
- I help you blog ihelpyoublog.com
- John Chow johnchow.com
- Daily Blog Tips dailyblogtips.com
- Problogger.com problogger.com
- Lorelle on WordPress lorelle.wordpress.com
- Incomediary.com incomediary.com
- Performancing performancing.com
- Build a better Blog buildabetterblog.com
- Copy Blogger blogcatalog.com
- Blogtrepreneur blogtrepreneur.com
- Successful Blog successful-blog.com
- Blog About Your Blog blogaboutyourblog.com
- Entrepreneurs-Journey entrepreneurs-journey.com
- Quick Online Tips quickonlinetips.com
- Internet Marketing for Mommies internetmarketingformommies.com
- Chris Brogan chrisbrogan.com
- Lip-Sticking lipsticking.com
- Cafe Blogger cafeblogger.net
- Social Hallucinations socialhallucinations.com
- Carl Ocab carlocab.com
- Bash Bosh bashbosh.com
Acknowledgements to Get Rich Click/Marc Ostrofsky for the original list.
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Getting yourself out of the rat race and earning passive income through various investment channels is a dream of many. It is also a good side income to look forward to every month. This article will suggest good books to equip you the reader with relevant knowledge to get started on your passive income journey. Read on to find out how to make money work for you while you sleep!
1. “Four Hour Work Week” by Timothy Ferriss
Highly regarded, what this book lays out may seem a tad unachievable and overly ambitious. However, exposing yourself to such ideals can provide perspective on what to work towards. Look forward to learning about Parkinson’s Law, the importance of outsourcing work, investing in the right people, finding a niche that you love and is in demand, as well as what goes behind a seemingly ‘effortless’ income stream. Behind the successful façade lies a lot of sleepless nights producing blueprints, developing your system, analyzing the business environment and more. This book is sure to motivate you to start working hard now in order to reap the rewards in due course.
2. “Virtual Freedom: How to Work with Virtual Staff to Buy More Time, Become More Productive, and Build Your Dream Business” by Chris Ducker
Often times, our attention is drawn towards new and brilliant business ideas. However, even unexciting business solutions can be profitable if executed well. As such, the team running a company can directly determine how successful the business will be. This book addresses just that by focusing on how to spend resources on building and improving a virtual team. If you need tangible examples and applications for business strategies, look no further. With a virtual support team, you can channel your energy on high level tasks. You can also be assured that your company will function 24/7 at a relatively low cost. Automation as a secret to a successful venture is made understandable through this read.
3. “Invisible Selling Machine” by Ryan Deiss
E-mail marketing takes the spot light in this book. A comprehensive read, Invisible Selling Machine provides you with a step-by-step guide for you to get started quickly. Doing your business right from the very beginning can build a solid foundation that will prove to be handy in future. Topics covered are not limited to consumer engagement, valuable content creation, reputation, buyer segmentation, consumer re-engagement and more.
For those with shorter attention span, you will be relieved to know that this is a short read with a great mix of stories, information and case studies to keep you going for more. Regardless of which stage you are at in your business, and regardless of your focus being e-mails, landing page or auto-responders, this book will prove to be helpful in improving your business to better your passive income stream. Having basic computer knowledge will also allow you to make full use of the content.
4. “KaChing: How to Run an Online Business that Pays and Pays” by Joel Comm
The catchy title has an equally catchy content. KaChing: How to Run an Online Business that Pays and Pays is a beginner’s guide to starting your own online business through a blog. If you prefer to feel as though you are speaking to the writer directly, this book is perfect for you. Hear him narrate and motivate through personal experience and learn about pitfalls to avoid, and how to translate your idea into an actual product. Business opportunities, uniqueness of product, content monetization, knowledge selling, affiliate programmes, membership sites, coaching and more are just some of the new media marketing tactics explored in this book.
5. “The Power of Passive Investing: More Wealth with Less Work” by Richard A. Ferri
Instead of actively picking stocks, Ferri proposes low cost index funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) as easy and accessible alternatives to allocate funds to stocks, bonds, and other asset classes. By providing exposure to selected broad markets, you reduce the risk of loss from individual securities.
This book is not just for investors, but also for brokers, consultants, people from trust departments, people overseeing endowments and pension funds as well as investment advisors. If you are confident of making passive income a full-time endeavor in the comfort of your home, give this book a read.
If you would like to know how to select and create a portfolio using low-cost index funds and ETFs, you can read his co-authored book, “The Bogleheads’ Guide to Retirement Planning“.
At the end of the day, passive investment is not the same as easy or mindless investment. While you play a less active role, there is still a need to research extensively and to monitor the market. The effort that goes behind the sustainable and income stream should not be forgotten.
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I’m a Scientist!
I started work in 1979 as a lab technician with BIP (British Industrial Plastics, a monicker that is long gone). They kitted me out in a white lab coat and I got to call myself a scientist. That was pretty cool in those days. Being a lab technician was a bit like being a bakery worker. The principles of baking and making pvc are very similar, involving the mixing of ingredients in strict, controlled quantities. Believe it or not, Baking Soda is also used in PVC, but that’s another story!
Active Income
I was only 19 when I started work and there was no problem with the physical side of the job. We were all full of vim and vigour back then. It was hard work at times, lumping 25kg bags about, but when I got my pay packet it was all worth it. I got only £60 a week in those days, but beer was only about 35p a pint back then, so that was ok. I was no different from most people in the uk. We did 38 hrs a week and were paid a fixed rate per hour. We were earning ‘active’ income.
Some years later, as I became interested in the Internet and people were making obscene sums of money in the tech bubble, I came across the concept of ‘passive income’. Unlike my days as a lab technician where I was paid once and if I wanted another week’s wage i’d have to turn up for work for another 38 hours, this seemed unbelievable. Passive income means working only once, but getting paid for it over and over. “Surely that’s the future of work!”, I thought. That’s the way that entrepreneurs do it. I wanted to be an entrepreneur.
Google Adsense
Whilst still making plastic, i started investigating websites and monetizing them with Google Adsense advertising. Back in the day, Adsense became a good earner for me, around £4k in fact, back in 2006. It was true Passive Income. But, it became more difficult as Google changed it’s algorithms to weed out what they regarded as spammy websites. Unintentionally, it affected all website owners. Websites completely disappeared from Google overnight. Incomes were slashed. Reward became too low for the effort involved. I was back to Active Income for a while longer. Since then, i’ve dabbled with building websites for people, and still have active clients who pay me, but it was still ‘Active’ (except those paying hosting fees, who are ‘Passive’).
Zoom forward to 2014 when I rented out my house to move to Durham. I became an accidental landlord. But without really thinking about it, i’d started earning true Passive Income. The rent basically pays the mortgage. That’s when the penny dropped. We could earn passive income from property! But I didn’t really want to be a proper landlord and didn’t have money for the deposits anyway.
Passive Income
Suddenly and out of the blue, I was made redundant in 2016. This meant I got a payment which after considering options we invested in more property and last year it started to generate ££££ in passive income through rent. This means we now have multiple properties and all our mortgages are paid for from their Passive Income. The house we live in is paid for by two of the others. How good is that ??????
Passive Income is truly what will set us free. The next stage is to find more quality properties to invest in. This time, we’ll be targetting other strategies to maximise the income.
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